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Fitbit Ionic review: For fitness enthusiasts

As a brand Fitbit has garnered a loyal set of fan following among fitness enthusiasts.

| Gadgets Now | Updated: Jan 26, 2018, 01.57PM IST

Critic Rating3.5/5

Top Features

*Comfortable fit*Sleep tracker*5 day battery life

As a brand Fitbit has garnered a loyal set of fan following among fitness enthusiasts. It has in a way become the go to brand when it comes to wearables. After making a mark in fitness bands, the brand has unveiled its smartwatch – the Fitbit Ionic. Smartwatches in India are still at a nascent stage and are waiting for their watershed moment. Will the Ionic provide that moment? Read our review of the Ionic smartwatch which is priced at Rs 22,990.

Design

The Fitbit Ionic is a comfortable smartwatch, not clunky and extremely light to hold. It certainly has an edge over its competition in terms of looks and weight. In fact, mostly it didn’t even feel like we were wearing a smartwatch as it was like using any regular watch with plastic straps. In addition to that, the watch – unlike a few others -- isn’t an hindrance while working on a laptop or any other keyboard.

Fitbit Ionic’s body is made of aluminium and looks very attractive. It has small hardware buttons placed on both the sides. On the left edge is the power button and can be used for switching the screen on and off, and also, to return to the home screen. The other two buttons on the right can be used to perform various other functions. The buttons work smoothly and make the watch simple to use. The straps of the smartwatch can be changed too, and we got a separate pair of straps in the box which can be used once the original ones get spoiled or if you get bored with the original ones.

Coming to the display of the watch, it has a full colour screen that’s rectangular in shape. The colours and the icons on the screen were crisp and clear. Another good thing about it was its brightness. It was what made it easy for us to read everything with ease even with the dark background of the watch. Furthermore, sunlight readability was not a problem too. Not once did we find the smartwatch too reflective.

The touchscreen display was extremely responsive and using it was a seamless experience. However, the raise to wake feature doesn’t always work. Also, we would have preferred slightly thinner bezels.

Overall, while we really liked the design of the smartwatch and found it very comfortable to wear, we felt that the display could have been a little better.

Performance

The Fitbit Ionic smartwatch comes with a built-in GPS, and promises a battery life of over four days. It has a number of features like Dynamic Personal Coaching, a heart rate monitor, a SmartTrack feature that automatically tracks various exercises like running and biking. It also has a SpO2 sensor that is used to track diseases like Sleep Apnea by testing blood oxygen levels. It also features Fitbit Coach that offers on-device step-by-step instructions for seven minutes workout, 10 minutes abs and treasure chest. The smartwatch also has additional features like storing and playing music (courtesy the 2.5 GB of storage) and will soon also be equipped to make payments using Fitbit Pay. Fitbit Ionic works with Android, iOS and Windows.

You need to have the Fitbit app installed on your smartphone and connect your watch with it to make it work. Once you do this and Ionic is synced, automatically tracks your steps the entire day. Not just that, it also reminds you every hour how much more you need to walk to finish your hourly goal. We found this feature to be really good, as when at work, one often forgets to how long they have been sitting at particular place.

However, we have to admit that the tracker was slightly inaccurate. Even when we were driving or were in the train, the number of steps automatically increased, as did the calories burnt. There was one incident, when right in the morning even with 0 steps, it showed us some calories burnt -- something that again shows inaccuracy.

The smartwatch is water-resistant up to 50 meters and can be taken for swimming. We didn’t take it for a swim, but we did sleep with the watch on. The sleep tracking ability of the Ionic is accurate – it tracks when you sleep, are restless in bed and the time you were awake. The data on the app was also divided into various stages.

The watch has one set target audience and that is the fitness enthusiasts. It’s Fitbit Coach feature gives step-by-step instructions on how to go about various workouts. It’s a feature that many people will appreciate. You can even store music on the smartwatch and play it on headphones via Bluetooth. Again, a feature that can be handy while working out. The smartwatch also has a heart-rate monitor that works real time. You can go back on the app on your phone and check the data. It will show you your resting heart rate, and calories burnt.

The watch doesn’t only focus on physical health but also on the mental health of the person wearing it. It has an app that has some breathing exercises which helps in relaxing at the end of a long, tiring day.

The main highlight, however, of the smartwatch is its battery life. Living up to its promise, it really did last for 5 days on a single charge. And what makes it better is that it’ll only take you a couple of hours to charge the smartwatch. However, with GPS on and when using the Ionic for music, the battery life may become lesser.

Verdict

The Fitbit Ionic has its fair share of pros and cons. It’s comfortable to wear and boasts of an excellent battery life. The sleep tracker, the Coach feature and the heart-rate monitor work seamlessly but the accuracy of the tracker was a bit suspect. At a price of Rs 22,990, it is a reasonable buy. However, we expect a more interactive user interface and may be some a few additional features like navigation.